Angelo, wife flying home together?

CLARK FIELD, Pampanga — Filipino truck driver Angelo de la Cruz, who recently said his Iraqi abductors would release him soon, may return to the Philippines together with his wife Arsenia, a labor official said yesterday.

"It is best that the couple fly back home at the same time," Department of Labor and Employment (DOLE) Central Luzon director Josefino Torres said in a hastily called press conference he and Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD) Assistant Secretary Alicia Bala held here Saturday night.

He did not say whether Angelo’s brother Jesse, 32, who flew to Jordan together with Arsenia a week ago, would fly home earlier.

Torres said Arsenia has been informed that her youngest son, four-year-old Jeffrey, was hospitalized last Friday at the Angeles University Foundation Medical Center (AUFMC) and was reported to be recuperating from "acute bronchitis, pending pneumonia and mild dehydration."

"She was relieved upon hearing that her son was immediately brought to the hospital," Torres said, adding that Jeffrey is "doing fine at the hospital."

AUFMC director Ollie Villaraza told The STAR that Jeffrey had to be transferred from the pediatrics ward on the hospital’s fifth floor after people looking after patients in the same ward complained of being disturbed by journalists who insisted on interviewing Jeffrey or his guardians.

Villaraza advised journalists to talk to Jeffrey’s attending physician, Daniel Cruz, or the resident physician of the pediatrics department for updates on Jeffrey’s condition.

In a joint statement, Torres and Bala said that at the beginning of the hostage crisis, President Arroyo had instructed Labor Secretary Patricia Sto. Tomas to "mobilize the DOLE and the Overseas Workers Welfare Administration (OWWA) to attend to the physical well-being of the De la Cruz family while eagerly awaiting" Angelo’s return to the Philippines.

"Since then, the family, with its members’ full consent and cooperation, has been housed in a place where basic necessities are being provided. This kind of service is nothing new to the DOLE and OWWA as these agencies have provided the same to similarly situated overseas Filipino workers," the statement read.

But during the press conference, Torres said Angelo’s children "spend their own money" whenever they go out of the housing unit to buy what they need.

The government had taken custody of Jeffrey and his older siblings the other Friday and initially brought them to a two-story housing unit with a centralized air-conditioning system near the Mimosa resort complex at the Clark special economic zone. Two days later, they were transferred to another location, reportedly another air-conditioned housing unit at the nearby Fontana resort, also within Clark.

Earlier, Pampanga Gov. Mark Lapid said he had been providing food for the De la Cruz family, whose home in Barangay Buenavista in Mexico, Pampanga is a small concrete and wood structure, with only one electric fan to provide ventilation.

"For the last few days, the government officials who are with the De la Cruz (family) have been discussing with them certain future undertakings that can be had with Mang Angelo guiding them. For instance, some alternative sources of income are being mulled. Sources of scholarships for the school-going children are being eyed for their access," Torres and Bala said in their statement.

They added that the DSWD, DOLE and OWWA "are also offering their services to guide the family to utilize more productively and wisely the assistances being offered to them by other government and private sector agencies, institutions and individuals."